Gift
by Les-Gateaux
Summary: Yumiko has a vision of her brother's death, and can do nothing to stop it.


Disclaimer: I finally own a (pirated) copy of PSP8. Who cares about Tenipuri? Oh, right, me.

Yes, I'm back. For how long? Probably not longer than a month, unless I get addicted again, which is very very likely, given how interesting my schedule looks this year. Of course, if I don't get sufficient reviews (ego-boosting), I'll quit again. Yeah, I've turned into an elitist bitch. Bite me.

Excuses for my hiatus: Firstly, I love you all. So don't kill me please. Uhm, would you believe if I said chemistry? Or…or grounding? Or that a rabid dinosaur ate my house (including my laptop and internet connection)?

Anyways, you guys can speculate. But yes, I am back, and will start off my return with a shitty piece of angst because the humor portion of my mind grew dusty while memorising common ions.

**Gift**

'_You have a Gift,' she says, and the girl in the mirror gazes back with unfeeling eyes. 'You can see the future, and you cannot change it, so you must remember to never see the future of anyone you hold dear. You cannot.' _

_The mirror image looks at her, and says nothing. And she hopes that she will remember the pledge, because already she has been tempted to gaze forwards, to see Death or Fortune within the paths of her family. But she does not, not even when Syusuke looks up at her with adoring eyes and asks her to please see if he will win his tennis match, not when Yuuta wants to know what kind of cake he's getting for his birthday next week, not when Okaasan and Otousan want to make sure their darling boys are all right at camp. She does not, because she does not want to know. _

_Knowing something, and not being able to change it – powerless is what she feels, despite that accursed Gift of hers, and thus she makes this promise to her reflection. She is eleven then. _

_She is twenty-one when she breaks it. _

* * *

"Camp?" Yumiko asks, grinning widely. "My little brothers are all grown up! Oh, I remember when I first went to camp…ten years ago…"

"Yeah, well, 'kaa-san favored you," Yuuta mutters, sprawled on top of Syusuke's bed.

Said older brother flicks silky strands over one shoulder. "Besides, 'nee-san, your memory's not that good." He smiles indulgently as she throws a magazine at him. "My, my, aren't you naughty?"

"…damn," she replies, remembering just which magazine she'd been flipping through. Oh well; pure innocent Syu-chan was bound to be corrupted at some point. "So, let's see. You're traveling first class, you get suites in some five-star hotel…" She flips the brochure over. "What is this _for_? Oh, tennis, of course."

Syusuke gently nudges Yuuta off the bed. "By 'hotel', they mean 'college dorms', and by 'first class', they mean 'luggage compartment,' he explains. "Really, people shouldn't lie on these things."

"How would you know?" Yuuta retorts, words muffled under a pillow.

"Because, Yuuta, some of us have already been to camp." He dodges the pillow. "I don't know how you even got in with that kind of aim." Another pillow, more accurate, and Syusuke catches it deftly, then tosses it back to his sister, along with her magazine. "We're leaving Wednesday."

Yumiko raises an eyebrow. "You won't be coming to see me leave on my business trip then? Really, I'm hurt."

"You'll live." Syusuke glances at the clock. "Yuu-chan, almost time for bed," he calls, mimicking their mother's voice perfectly. "Don't forget to brush your teeth for three minutes to keep them nice and shiny so you can get as many girls as Syu-chan!"

"Shut _up_, you egotist," Yuuta growls, trying to ignore Yumiko's laughter. He stalks from the room, his sister following.

She turns at to doorway to say goodnight, and the Gift comes to her unbidden – a dark shadow over the boy's face, skin vanishing to reveal a grinning death's head – and then Syusuke's standing in front of her, worried, asking why she's suddenly gone so pale.

She says it's nothing, and bids him goodnight.

* * *

_The Gift grows more powerful when she reaches adolescence. She notices this in the way her predictions are entirely accurate, and she can see larger things.It also begins coming to her when she does not need it – does not want it, really; the caduceus appears over Yuuta's head, and he's sick for a fortnight, and she wonders whether she could have stopped it. _

_It does not only portent misfortune, of course. She catches glimpses of happiness – sees her brothers winning tournaments, watches that boy whose name she never can remember teach Yuuta new moves – and she smiles at them. But she sees other symbols – the snake, the day Yuuta finds out his manager's betrayal; the broken crown, when Syusuke loses a tournament he's been preparing for for half a year; the skull, when her canary escapes and is attacked by a fox. _

_She grows to fear herself, and tries to dispose of her Gift. 'I don't want you!' she screams at the mirror, smashing her hands against it until glass shards shatter around her. And she kneels in the glass, pain cutting through her, and prays that the pain will drive the Gift from her veins. _

_At sixteen, she begins to hate herself. _

* * *

The shadow follows Syusuke on Wednesday, the damned skull. She tells herself she is imagining things, that she has long conquered her Gift, and that she has always been afraid of planes. Syusuke is cheerful, Yuuta excited, and she reassures herself with words that are empty and meaningless.

The plane leaves at four. At three thirty, she pulls out the tarot cards, dusty and worn, and spreads them out, murmuring her brother's name over them.

One hand reaches out and tremblingly flips over the first two cards.

_The apple tree and the skull. _

Yumiko falls to her knees, and her Gift surges within her, dragging forth a picture of a newspaper clipping. She squints, pained, to make out a few sentences. _Plane crashes in valley…back seats completely uninjured…Fuji Yuuta… survived in first class, protected by…brother's body…touching display of love…_

* * *

_She is beautiful, and she knows it; she is also sadistic, much like her brother. She takes to telling fortunes on the street, and draws a large crowd. Unsatisfied with happiness, she takes the most pleasure in telling girls that their boyfriends will be drafted, telling mothers their sons are dead, telling children that their fathers have disappeared forever. _

_And the Gift is satisfied. She allows it to rise during the day, and it leaves her alone at night, when she is with her family. They do not approve – Syusuke frowns at her once, and she considers giving up the trade, but cannot; it raises a steady income, and she wishes to move out from her family quickly, so that she will not be tempted to gaze at their futures. _

_The Gift still throws images at her, but small things; she finds a match where Syusuke will win, and she goes to cheer him on. Otherwise, it ignores them – 'kaasan and 'tousan and Yuuta and Syusuke, and for that she is grateful. _

_Then she turns twenty, and is given a respectable vocation, and the Gift is ignored; it swells stronger than ever, until it pains her, and she collapses on her bedroom floor. She begins telling fortunes again, but the Gift will not be appeased, and she can see shadows everywhere now, closing in, surrounding her. _

_Suffocating her…_

* * *

The Gift has given her a choice. For the first time, she thinks she has the ability to change the future. She lifts her cellphone, clutching it in both hands.

"I can tell Syusuke to change seats," she whispers. "I can…I can save him…"

_And kill Yuuta,_ the Gift reminds her. _And kill some innocent who may have a family as well…_

"But if I change the future, maybe Syusuke will…"

_You foolish girl. Nothing can change the future. You have already made your choice, and it is Yuuta. _

Her fingers press the familiar numbers. "Syusuke?"

"'Neesan? Something wrong?"

"Have you…gone up yet?"

Silvery laughter. "Yeah, and I just found out Yuuta's scared of heights. But what is it?"

She pauses, and finds that she's crying, tears dripping onto the luminous screen. "'Neesan?" Syusuke asks again, concerned. "'Neesan?"

"Have fun at camp," she manages. "I love you."

"I love you too," he says, bemused, and she clicks 'end', clasping the phone, whispering 'I love you' to the silent screen. She is still lying on the floor when her parents return, still holding the phone when it rings, still whispering the three words when the police bring Yuuta home.

She is silent when she lays out the tarot cards and reads her own future, and all she sees is Death.

Syusuke has a knife, a souvenir from their trip to Kyoto, and she brings this with her into the bathroom. No one pays any attention to her; she gazes into the mirror and runs a hand down the clear glass.

"Hello," she says to her reflection. "We've gone through a lot, haven't we?"

No answer, but she expected none. The steel is cold against her wrist, and her movements are quick; crimson splashes into the basin and smears the glass. She laughs, wildly, at her reflection. "I've killed you!" she cries, and does not know whether she is speaking to herself, to Syusuke, or to the Gift.

For the Gift is leaving her now; she can feel it seeping from her skin, and she laughs again, vision clouding. Her reflection is gone, but she does not realize that she is lying on the floor; she struggles to breathe, and struggles to die.

Her eyes flutter, and then there is only one shadow left – a smiling boy, holding out his hand to her.

_I love you, 'Neesan…_

* * *

A/N: Oh, dear, I'm a morbid child. Blame it on Moon Child's theme song, which is as emo/angsty (depending upon which word's in fashion; they seem to fluctuate rather quickly) as possible. And also a favorite song of mine. So.

See that little button? You know, the review button? Yeah. Press it. I less than three you all.

Humor next time. I promise.


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